Deposits fuel Ghana banking sector assets increase to GH¢55b – Bank of Ghana

The total assets in the banking sector moved from GH¢40 billion in March 2014, to GH¢55.1 billion in March 2015, the Bank of Ghana has said.

According to the central bank, the assets growth was mainly funded by deposits which recorded an annual growth of 30.8 percent to GH¢34 billion at the end of March 2015.

The governor of the Bank, Dr. Kofi Wampah told reporters in Accra that the non-performing loans (NPL) ratio improved from 12.4 percent in March 2014 to 12.1 percent in March 2015.

“Adjusting for the fully provisioned loss category, the NPL ratio went up from 4.4 percent to 5.5 percent,” he said.

He indicated that interest rates have broadly declined during the period. Between December 2014 and April 2015:

“Both the 91-day and 182-day Treasury bill rates fell from 25.8 percent and 26.4 percent to 25.1 percent and 25.8 percent respectively,” he said.

The one-year note rate remained unchanged at 22.5 percent, the three-year bond rate fell from 25.4 to 22.5 percent, while the five-year bond rate rose to 21 percent from 19.0 percent, he noted.

The weighted average interbank rate, he said, “declined marginally to 23.3 percent in April 2014, from 23.7 percent in December 2014.”

He said the average lending rates of the banks have remained stable at 29.0 percent in March 2015 while the average rate on the three-month deposits declined to 13.0 percent in March from 13.9 percent in December 2014.

There are currently 28 commercial banks licensed to operate in Ghana.

Download list of banks here.

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi